This week I got my hair cut. I was very impressed with myself actually. Our hairdressers run an online booking system, and somehow I was amazingly organised enough back in February, when Boris announced the slow lifting of restrictions, to hop online and book myself a 9am appointment for Monday 12 April- the day they were due to re-open. I got very excited as the hour approached, and when I finally sat in the chair, feeling the warm water on my head, smelling the familiar bubbly shampoo and enjoying the basic pampering of having my hair washed by someone else; I realised it was these simple pleasures that mean more to me now than ever before.
We all have our bucket lists. Well, I do. I still have actual mountains to climb and continents to explore on mine – although the older I get the countries I can visit are dwindling as time isn’t expanding the last time I checked; and unless I visit 4 countries a year from now until I am 100 years old, I am going to have to prioritise this bit of the list somewhat. I have also come to realise what was important to me a few years ago, has completely changed. Whether my point of view is different now after having a pretty awful time with my mental health for a year or so; the recent death of a friend at a young age; the pandemic that has shattered the plans and dreams of devastated nations or just the fact I am a little more mature – I look at my bucket list now and see most of what is on it are visits to far away places - not necessary dreams, feelings and experiences.
Let me explain. I do have an actual bucket list. In fact, it is a spreadsheet with columns to fill in as and when I achieve my goals, and I put it together one rainy afternoon about 15 years ago (relating to last week’s topic - talk about ultimate procrastination)! However, out of the 50 or so things on my list, it mostly reads like a To-Do Tick list of the rich and jobless. Visit Sydney Opera House. Visit the Great Barrier Reef. Stay in a Rainforest Eco-Lodge. Visit Madagascar. Drive across the Golden Gate Bridge. Visit Machu Picchu. Climb Kilimanjaro. See the Mona Lisa. Visit Niagara Falls. Visit the Rothko Chapel in Texas. Visit Temples in Thailand. Go to Barcelona to see some Gaudi architecture. Travel on the Orient Express. See the Northern Lights sitting in a hot tub in Iceland. A few of these I have achieved, the majority I have not. And as I scan down my list, I feel I am missing the point. What about adventure? What about experiences? What about participation?
To me, looking at my bucket list through post-covid eyes, it reads like a schoolgirl’s dream of Places I’d Like To Visit When I Grow Up – as if the goal of ticking them off will give me some sense of satisfaction like a stamp collector filling in an album. Queuing around the block to stand on tiptoe at the Louvre to glimpse the enigmatic smile of the Mona Lisa over the shoulders of strangers for thirty seconds - will this appease my lust for adventure or just enable me to fill in the ‘Done’ box on my spreadsheet? Is my Fear Of Missing Out dictating my pleasure?
I think I am beginning to see I really have got my wires crossed with what actually brings me joy, to what I think does. I haven’t travelled much, but when I have done so for work in the past, a lot of what I have seen has been on my own - and you know, there is something rather empty about achieving what you think you wanted to achieve - on your own. I’ve ticked off a few of those places off my list. I’ve stood craning my neck upwards overwhelmed at the beauty of my favourite New York skyscrapers, but felt unfulfilled as I had no-one to share the experience with. I’ve swum in luxury hotel open air pools overlooking the harbour in Hong Kong wishing someone was with me to capture the moment. I’ve stood transfixed in a Thai Temple trying to soak up the atmosphere but very aware it was me, alone, far away, yearning for my boys and husband to experience the same smell of incense and tinkling of bells – just not the same when played back through a phone a week or so later. I’ve felt melancholic as I have stared out of aeroplane windows, woozy with wine and jet lag, looking down on the vast world beneath me, pointing out to myself the landmarks and cities I pass over, making a mental note to return to this same state - but next time with a friend or a loved one sitting in the seat next to me, rather than a snoring stranger.
Simple pleasures. Sipping hot sweet tea from a flask on a beach, warming up after the shock of a swim in the cold sharp sea. Coffee and cake in the sunshine watching my boys climb trees. Giggling with friends so hard you can’t breathe. Snuggling up to another soul watching sunsets and sunrises. Hiking along windswept beaches or cliffs, the sea too noisy for proper conversation; or listening to the shimmering heat of a mid-Summer meadow where the only sound is a chirruping skylark or a buzzing bee. Or just parking myself on a bench with my mum, passing the time of day with idle gossip and watching the world go by. All the simple pleasures I love. And whether I am doing any of these activities in LA or London, the Caribbean or Cromer – it is the shared experience, the feelings, the meaning that is more important to me now.
I still have my bucketful of dreams. I still wish to climb a mountain and hope it is Kilimanjaro and I have every intention of trekking the Inca trails one day or jumping on a train to transverse a continent or two – but they may stay as dreams and I may have to contend with reading National Geographic or Wanderlust Magazines instead, and hey, that’s OK. What has become more important to me, is reality - the hand holding, hugs and even haircuts. Those simple pleasures that we take for granted. Because without them, the world is a lonely old place.
© The Real Tilly Fairfax
